Dowry death: ‘They did not have to burn my sister alive for Rs 10 lakh’

On Saturday, Jasmeet Singh sounded helpless as he recounted the horror of harassment his sister, Parvinder Kaur, went through until she was set on fire by her husband and in-laws burnt on Friday night.
“Their demands were never ending. Yet, we had been fulfilling all of them ever since she married to him in 2012. But this time we really did not have the money, when they asked for Rs. 10 lakh a fortnight ago,” Singh alleged
Singh alleged that when his family expressed their helplessness in handing over the amount, Kaur and her four-year-old son were thrown out from the house in Vikaspuri’s H-block around a fortnight ago.
“To justify their act of throwing my sister and nephew out, they cooked up false stories against her. But their real motive was to teach us a lesson for refusing their dowry demands,” alleged Singh.
Investigators, however, said that Kaur’s husband and in-laws had denied all allegations of dowry harassment. “They claim that trust issues led to frequent quarrels between the couple that ended up in her killing,” said a police officer, adding that sections pertaining to dowry demand is likely to be added to the FIR after recording statements of the victim’s relatives.
The victim’s brother told Hindustan Times that the dowry demands had begun weeks after the couple’s marriage in 2012.
“Whenever my sister tried to resist, she would be physically and verbally abused. She would bear the pain as they had threatened to kill all her near and dear ones if she resisted,” he alleged.
When Kaur and her four-year-old son were allegedly kicked out of her husband’s home a fortnight ago, she carried with her only a few essential items.
Her family said Kaur had avoided returning to her husband’s home for two weeks. But she went there to collect her son’s clothes on Friday. She thought she would also use this opportunity to collect some of the other essential documents left behind, said a family member, adding that she didn’t know that her husband and in-laws had allegedly planned to kill her. “We found the smell of kerosene, a broken match box and two burnt match sticks, among other things, at the crime scene,” said Vijay Kumar, DCP (west).
The officer confirmed that it was not a case of suicide but murder, citing her dying declaration. In her statement before the magistrate, Kaur named her husband and in-laws.
“It is not that they really needed our money. They just took us as an easy source of money. They did not have to burn my sister alive for that,” said Jasmeet.